


The Lost Village

by Deannie



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Ghost Stories, found in my vault unfinished and alone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-05-16
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:28:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24212128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deannie/pseuds/Deannie
Summary: Rey frowned at him. “I know what a ghost story is,” she told him dismissively.“I didn’t.” Finn used that hesitant, little voice that reminded her that, as much as she had had a hard life, she’d at least had a life. Friends some of the time. Ghost stories. Finn had been raised as a numbered soldier, bred to fight. She was sure he’d had no time for dwelling on things that went bump in the night.
Kudos: 3





	The Lost Village

“...and bent on revenge, Matta jumped out from behind the—” Poe broke off as Rey sat down between him and Finn.

“What are you doing?” she asked. Poe had been very animated in his discussion, so much so that it had drawn her attention as she wandered through the camp. 

“ _ We _ are telling ghost stories,” Poe announced, as if it were some sort of fine fete.

“Ghost stories?” Rey asked.

Finn immediately brightened. “He was telling me all about them—see, you tell stories about things that scare you, and you try to—”

Rey frowned at him. “I  _ know _ what a ghost story is,” she told him dismissively.

“I didn’t.” Finn used that hesitant, little voice that reminded her that, as much as she had had a hard life, she’d at least had a life. Friends some of the time. Ghost stories. Finn had been raised as a numbered soldier, bred to fight. She was sure he’d had no time for dwelling on things that went bump in the night.

Perhaps she could help make up for lost time.

“Well, go on then,” she gestured to Poe. “Let’s hear the rest of it.”

Poe smiled to let her know he’d been trying to accomplish the same thing. “All right… So, Matta had been stalking the pack of zambs for  _ days _ , searching for the one that had killed his father—”

“I’m sorry,” Rey interrupted. “What’s a zamb?”

“It’s a dead body that’s been animated by an evil spirit,” Poe explained shortly. “Matta was sure one of these was the one,” he continued. “So he crept up, hiding behind the yuchama trees until the pack passed. And then Matta leapt out and went at them! He slaughtered five of the six before the last one finally turned to him and the face he saw froze him solid.” His eyes were wide and shocked, and Rey grinned a bit to see Finn hanging on every word of the admittedly obvious story.

“Well!?” Finn finally asked, fit to burst. “Who was it?”

“The face was his  _ father’s _ ,” Poe intoned solemnly. “They hadn’t killed him, they had turned him into one of  _ them _ .”

“No way!” Finn crowed. “So, what’d he do?”

Poe looked tragic. “What could he do?” he asked. “He brought his father peace. Saved him from the zambs forever.”

Finn grinned happily. “Man, that was great. He went after them because he thought they killed his father, and then  _ he _ ended up killing him instead.” Rey was amused by her friend’s almost childlike enthusiasm. “The twist— _ that’s _ what makes it a good story.”

Poe cocked his head and spread his arms wide in agreement. “Best part of any story.”

“What about you, Rey?” Finn asked, as she just knew he would. “Do you have any good ghost stories?”

Rey smiled slyly. Oh, they were begging for it, weren’t they?

“Ghost stories, no,” she said, self-deprecating. “I’m no good at those. The zambs you talked about, though? We have something like them on Jakku. Well, perhaps not  _ quite _ like them.”

“Zambs?” Poe asked, scoffing. “Come on, zambs are made up. They don’t exist.”

Rey nodded. “No, I’m sure they don’t. We have a sand creature called a dakaf, though. Lives in the northern deserts.” She saw them both make the connection to the location where they’d first crash landed. 

“It’s undead?” Poe asked.

“Oh, no,” she said dismissively. “No, it burrows into the skin,” she explained. “They feed on blood, but need a living host. As the colony grows, it flows with the host’s blood, in and out of the heart and the brain.” Poe crinkled his nose. “Eventually the dakaf colony becomes so large that the mind and heart are overtaken. The host still lives, but they’re mindless, controlled by the dakaf. And they crave blood to keep the colony alive.”

Finn swallowed hard. “What does it look like—when a dakaf, you know… infiltrates?” he asked, as if it were nothing. As if he weren’t trying to recall whether he’d seen any signs of infiltration on his own body.

Rey kept her voice cool and blithe. “Usually people don’t even know it’s happened,” she said. “They slip in under fingernails or through eyes or ears.”

Poe was looking uncomfortable. “How long does it take a colony to grow?”

“Oh, it can take  _ years _ ,” she told him. “Why, there was a girl in Niima once, was lost in the northern deserts for a week when she was tiny. It wasn’t until she was nearly eighteen that the colony started taking over.”

“So what happened to her?” Finn wanted to know.

“Well, her father was a doctor—he saw right away that there was likely nothing he could do for her. Once the heart is compromised, the brain will follow, and that’s all there is to it.”

“She died?” Poe asked, already taken in by the story.

“Not exactly.” Rey leaned forward. They were hanging on her every word. “A dakaf-infested body can only be killed by cutting off the head and cutting out the heart. If you starve the colony, it leaves the body and you can kill them with fire.” She shrugged, as if it was of no consequence. “Or you can simply burn the host alive.”

Finn swallowed audibly. “There’s no other way to kill it. Like, without killing the host?”

“Well, this girl’s father wondered if maybe, he couldn’t remove her brain and preserve it.” She watched them both stare avidly. “Put it in another body.”

“Ew,” Finn said quietly. 

Poe smiled in appreciation. “So what did he do?” 

Rey smiled slyly. “He found another body.” As if it was of no consequence. “A young boy he found wandering in the wastes between Niima and Jeja.”

Finn was confused. “He took the kid? I mean, didn’t the kid have a family?”

Rey realized maybe she’d struck a chord she shouldn’t have. Had Finn had a family before he was a stormtrooper in traininïg? 

“No,” she averred quickly, exchanging a look with Poe. “No, his family had died in the sandstorms. He was alone.” She was struck by inspiration. “His mind was gone—burned out by the time in the sun.” Yes, that made it better.

Finn seemed to be fine with that, leaning forward again in anticipation. “So he… What?”

“He put his daughter’s brain into the young boy’s body,” Rey said simply. “She woke from the surgery able to walk and talk and function, just the way she’d done before.”

“Except now she was a boy,” Poe put in.

Rey sent him a mild glare. “Does that matter? At least she was alive.”

Finn nodded. “So, how’d the doctor explain it?”

“Well of course he couldn’t.” Rey shook her head sadly. “The doctor was accused of atrocity and ran with his wife and daughter—”

“Son,” Poe corrected gleefully.

Rey ignored him. “—into the desert. He settled in another town and introduced her as his son. No one knew any different.”

There was a long moment of silence and Rey waited.

“And that’s it?”

She looked at Finn as if to say,  _ of course that’s it. _

“I don’t buy it,” he replied flatly. “Something like that just isn’t possible.”

Rey sighed. “No of course not. You’re right.” She sat back slightly, studying the ground in front of her. “After all, once a dakaf colony infiltrated, it would stay in the brain, wouldn’t it?” She looked up through her eyelashes at him.

Finn took a minute and smiled. “She—”

“He—” Poe put in.

Finn glared at him. “Whatever. He still got taken over. Didn’t he?”

Rey shook her head. “No one really knows,” she told him vaguely. “You see, the entire town just… disappeared into the desert. One cycle it was there, and the next, the entire settlement…”

“Was a ghost town,” Finn finished in a whisper. He smiled big, the child-like grin infectious. Rey schooled herself not to join in. “Now  _ that _ is a great ghost story.”

“Is it?” Rey asked, watching Rose approach them in the gathering darkness. “The settlement was called Pileea. It’s known as the Lost Village. You should ask BB-8 to check the records for it.”

“Check the records for what?” Rose asked, looking at them all curiously. 

“Rey’s ghost story,” Poe told her.

Rose looked confused for a second before centering her attention on Finn. “Finn, we need you to help decipher one of the coded messages we intercepted from that First Order ship.”

Finn nodded seriously to the pair of them and disappeared with Rose into the shadows.

“Not bad,” Poe complimented with a smile. “The Lost Village, huh?”

Rey grinned. “The dakaf are real, too,” she told him, rising. She threw her parting shot back over her shoulder.

“I’d check my toes if I were you!”

*********

the end


End file.
